What's in a Name?

So, GYLE 59 - what is it?

It's the holy grail of brewing. Gyle 59 represents the ultimate batch of beer, the one all brewers are striving to create, the one all beer lovers hope to savour.

It's a declaration of gender equality in brewing.

Jon brewed 58 gyles at his previous brewery and the first batch made in the new brewery will be his 59th Gyle.

It's a constant reminder to get the mash or boil time correct.

It just represents the transition from the life of nomads (we took a year out travelling before setting up this brewery) to our next serious brewing adventure.

It's a combination of all these things, or none of them.

Gyle - what does it mean?

The word doesn't seem to show up in most dictionaries and if you search for the word on the internet the most popular return is a reference to the Gyle Shopping Centre in Edinburgh. The word doesn't even appear in the official Scrabble Dictionary!

Gyle is a word understood by brewers and HMRC. To a brewer, a gyle is simply a batch of beer. It's what comes out of the mash tun and is subsequently boiled and fermented to produce the wonderful drink we all know and love. It's the same for HMRC, except that their interest in the word only stretches as far as how much duty can be levied on it.

The word gyle appears in brewer's records dating back over centuries, but for some reason the word doesn't seem to have made it into most dictionaries. It's odd really, since beer is considered quintessentially English along with tea and cricket.

59 - what's the significance?

Well, obviously, it's a number. But not only that, it's a prime number.

It's a number that represents transition. After 59 seconds you get 1 minute, after 59 minutes you get 1 hour.

59 is an important number to feminists and appeared on badges worn during the 70's highlighting the differential in pay between women and men (for every dollar earned by a man it was believed that only 59 cents could be earned by a similarly qualified woman).